Iraqi offensive runs into no resistance

Wednesday

Jul 30, 2008 at 12:01 AMJul 30, 2008 at 10:17 AM

BAGHDAD -- Iraqi infantry, supported by artillery, the Iraqi air force and U.S. forces, yesterday began what was billed as a major operation in Diyala province northeast of Baghdad. Iraqi forces said they had encountered no resistance to the crackdown, which the army had announced six days earlier.

BAGHDAD -- Iraqi infantry, supported by artillery, the Iraqi air force and U.S. forces, yesterday began what was billed as a major operation in Diyala province northeast of Baghdad. Iraqi forces said they had encountered no resistance to the crackdown, which the army had announced six days earlier.

Residents of Baqouba, the provincial capital, awoke to find new checkpoints throughout the city, but most people stayed in their houses. Troops arrested 20 suspected insurgents in the southern and western quarters of the city, said a spokesman for Ali Ghaidan, the commander of Iraqi ground troops in the province.

As many as 30,000 troops from the 4th and 8th divisions of the Iraqi army were deployed, the spokesman said.

"The situation until now has been very good, and people are cooperating," said the spokesman, who couldn't be identified under the ground rules that Ghaidan set.

The spokesman said the offensive's main aim is to clear the province and its suburbs "of terrorists and outlaws," and the secondary aim is to secure the border with Iran.

Diyala province -- predominantly Sunni but with large Shiite and Kurdish minorities -- has been the scene of some of the bloodiest sectarian violence in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion. It remains one of the most restive -- and lethal -- provinces in the country.

The Diyala offensive follows major operations in Baghdad's Sadr City district, Basra, Mosul and Amarah. As was the case ahead of some of those operations, this one has been anticipated for weeks, giving insurgents time to escape.

As in Amarah and Basra -- where police chiefs were removed just before or during the operations -- there was a shakeup in Iraqi security forces in Diyala, with the dismissal Monday of the commander of military operations.